Inside a Dinosaur Bone

Dinosaurs are physiologically per? plexing animals. Dur ng the course of 160 million years, they inhabited a broad range of environments on every continent, including climatic extremes at high latitudes. They varied in size from small animals about one meter long and weighing two kilograms to giants al? most 50 meters long, weighing as much as 100 metric tons. They sported extrav? agant body ornaments?crests, spikes, frills, clubs, horns and armor?compet? ing with the morphological diversity of just about any group of animals that ever lived. Could a basically reptilian physiology account for the fantastic ac comphshments of these animals? Can we ever answer this question? A few fossilized eggs and some foot? prints notwithstanding, most of what we know of a dinosaur's life is de? duced from its bones. In some sense this is a pity, for a skeleton propped up on steel supports in a museum can never do justice to the dramatic cre? ation that was a living dinosaur. But a dinosaur's skeleton is more than mere?